Author Topic: Sky documentary  (Read 658 times)

irv_b

  • Self-Coat
  • *****
  • Posts: 1,040
Sky documentary
« on: March 26, 2020, 06:50:19 PM »
The other day I watched a fantastically interesting docu on SkyArts......Underfire; The untold story of Tony Vaccaro . For anyone that can get Sky it's about a photographer who went from the beaches on Normandy to the outskirts of Berlin in the second world war. The interesting bit was that he wasn't an official photographer he was an front line soldier - an American infantryman. The fact he survived that amount of time, fighting first hand was astounding enough but he shot 50 rolls of film with an Argus C3, carried them with him throughout, managed to develop some while in France and took some real cracking shots while under fire. The docu has some real points to make you think deep about whether to shoot a picture but as most of it was instinctive to him and appealed to his sense of art  he took it.
I don't know if you non Brits can get it somewhere on the "net" but it's worth an hour and a half of your time 

Francois

  • Self-Coat
  • *****
  • Posts: 15,768
Re: Sky documentary
« Reply #1 on: March 26, 2020, 08:26:10 PM »
The Argus C3 was the favorite camera of the infantry. It had been chosen for its robustness and it's simplicity. It could be repaired with almost no tools and was very reliable.

Another US military camera was the Kodak Medalist. This one was used on planes. Some people even said that you could drop it on an airplane carrier's runway, pick it up, load it and use it...
Francois

Film is the vinyl record of photography.

kentish cob

  • Peel Apart
  • ***
  • Posts: 358
  • I've a photographic memory, but it's out of film!
    • tony steers photography
Re: Sky documentary
« Reply #2 on: March 26, 2020, 08:45:36 PM »
Tony Vaccaro features in the BBC series "the genius of photography" .
I recall him telling of how he developed some film in 3 steel helmets, using chemicals found in the ruins of a bombed out pharmacy...
Very interesting man, and a very talented photographer.
Merveille de Bollwiller.
A hardy, vigorous and productive variety with large nuts!

http://www.steers-gallery.co.uk/
http://www.putaframearoundit.co.uk/

irv_b

  • Self-Coat
  • *****
  • Posts: 1,040
Re: Sky documentary
« Reply #3 on: March 26, 2020, 08:54:00 PM »

I recall him telling of how he developed some film in 3 steel helmets, using chemicals found in the ruins of a bombed out pharmacy...


Yes that bit was in the documentary

Bryan

  • Self-Coat
  • *****
  • Posts: 3,336
    • Flickr